City Buzz: The next chapter in Leeds Whitehall Road’s regeneration story

A RIVERSIDE regeneration boom in Leeds’s railway station district has allowed swathes of decades-dormant land to be transformed – and led to a “win-win” situation for the city.

That’s the view of one planning chief after a blueprint for three office blocks and a multi-storey car park on a four-acre site in Whitehall Road was approved.

Neil Walshaw, who sits on the City Plans Panel, said: “Ten years ago that area was a car park. It has changed from brownfield to high level, high rise, mixed use. It is a win-win situation.”

Now city working is set to get another boost as the council gives its backing to the latest in a series of planning applications that are turning Whitehall Road into Leeds’s newest boom quarter.

Leeds based property and investment company, Town Centre Securities, are behind the latest high rise development set to change the skyline near the railway station.

It will see three office buildings, a 10-level 500 space multi-storey car park, a pavilion with food and drink outlets and a gym on the ground floor.

Outline permission for the development at Whitehall Riverside, which covers more than four acres, was granted four years ago and city council plan chiefs have now given unanimous backing to a more detailed application.

The project will be constructed in two phases.

The first will see a 19,000 sq ft eight storey office block, with a glazed atrium adorned with gold aluminium, and the second is the car park with 173 spaces for the offices and 351 for the short-stay public.

Another ‘reserved matters’ application for the remaining two office blocks, pavilion and landscaping will be submitted at a later date.

Alistair Smith, associate director for Town Centre Securities, said the firm wants to be on site as soon as possible, once interest in the proposed development allows.

Within the last six months Central Point, Premier Inn and a number of food outlets and restaurants have opened in immediate vicinity of the site. City Buzz also reported last week that Ilkley based Hallborough Properties will create 26 apartments and food units over seven storeys and, less than half a mile away, Citylife Developments will build 224 apartments on Whitehall Road and 101 dwellings in a separate building in Holbeck.